TAIPEI, May 28 (Xinhua) -- Taiwan researchers have revealed the relationship between nest diversity and bird evolution after examining more than 8,000 kinds of bird nests from 242 avian families.
To have a functional nest, birds first need to select a site, and then construct a nest with a particular shape and attach it to a supporting object.
After analyzing the evolutionary paths of bird nests in terms of site, structure and attachment, researchers from Taiwan's "Academia Sinica" found that similarity in nest structures may reveal the nesters' evolutionary relationships.
The research also showed that today's diverse bird nests may also be related to two large-scale bird "adaptive radiation" events in the past. Adaptive radiation refers to the process in which organisms rapidly evolve into multiple types in order to adapt to changes in the environment.
Hung Chih-Ming, assistant research fellow at the institute's biodiversity research center, said that the emergence of multiple novel nest characteristics contributed, at least partially, to adaptive radiation in birds, and the diversification of bird nests might have resulted in the planet's current avian diversity.
"When the world is facing rapid climate and environment changes, the speed of nest character evolution can be a key for birds to survive in the future," said Hung.
The research was published in the journal Nature Communications on May 14.
